In Your Underwear: Life In Intentional Christian Community (book excerpt)

"...Until you get to that place of exposure, shock, and acceptance you are not really community..."

We were recently contacted by a network of house churches and intentional communities in Tampa, Florida called Tampa Underground/Underground Network. They recently released a book about intentional Christian community written by one of their communities that formed around 15 years ago. ‘In Your Underwear: Life In Intentional Christian Community‘ is edited by the Underground Network director Brian Sanders and is full of theory, personal experiences of the community members, and practical details of how it all works in their context.

I can honestly say I have been riveted by this book. As my wife and I prayerfully seek the LORD on our own path towards intentional Christian community this book is a reminder that we are not insane for wanting to pursue this missional way of life- and that in many ways, if we want to truly go hard after Jesus- pursuing a shared life together with other Christians is essential to embodying the Gospel.

The book begins with the chapter ‘Community as Exposure‘ and Brian starts off with a story about how he embarrasses himself by trying to run in his underwear towards the bathroom early one morning and in the process is seen by one of the other community members living in the house. He goes on to say:

“I think this story illustrates what we all decide to experience when we walk into community. We all must accept that we will get caught in our underwear. The journey into community must begin with the realization that we will all be exposed, that we will all feel vulnerable, and that we will all be subjected to the raw truth about each other. There are reasons people don’t share who they really are. People tend to hide the truth about themselves because exposure would be both embarrassing and offensive…We fear telling others the truth because the truth is ugly and because rejection is likely. We hide because we believe we will be able to preserve more relationships by projecting and protecting a false image of ourselves. I get it. But in community you kind of decide, “I am going to be exposed, and I am going to see if people will still want to be friends with me, if they will still love me once they know me.”

“…All communities are formed ultimately in their underwear. Until you get to that place of exposure, shock, and acceptance you are not really community. In his book Life Together, Dietrich Bonheoffer called it the shock of disillusionment. He argued that life together is not possible until you confront and progress beyond that moment when you say, “This stinks; this is not what I signed up for, and this is not community.” In other words, we all enter into community with false expectations; the problem is we don’t know what they are. Until those false expectations about what community is and who we are as individuals within it are released, there is no chance for real community.”

“…Community is hard only because we like to hide and because we like to lie. Community is hard because we are (more than we like to admit) self-centered and arrogant…If you have no community in your life, you have no spiritual immune system. And isn’t painfully obvious when so many of Jesus’ people seem to struggle with their character, mental health, and integrity in the same way as everyone else? It is not that Jesus doesn’t make a difference; it is that the presence of Jesus often comes in the package of his people (his body), and we have tried to live more as individuals than as part of something.”

Wherever you are in your journey towards deeper and more intentional community (in it’s many forms) with other Jesus followers this book is a great resource. Check it out!

(Editor’s Note- Disclosure: Sustainable Traditions receives free books including the book excerpted above. SustainableTraditions.com is an independent website free to express opinions, reviews and excerpts unhindered by any contractual requirements to any publishers or organizations.)

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I would read this book, and will add it to the list of “books to buy when there is a book budget.” I would even use it for a church discussion group if it is as good as the excerpt promises. But why do most intentional Christian communities end up (or start) in urban areas? We would be better off (ourselves, that is) in an intentional community in a rural setting. But that seems to be a rarity.

http://www.wiselywoven.com J Fowler

Hi Magdalena: I guess that’s where we come in- to live missionally and communally in pursuit of Jesus and His kingdom- in a rural context. Folks are doing it but they seem to be more authoritarian at times and more separatist – not always of course- and those communities don’t seem to write and talk about what they are doing as much. I could be wrong.

M Adele Connally

This sounds excellent- I’m looking forward to picking it up.
It certainly can be harder to find like-minded people in a rural setting, while the density of a city can provide more opportunities to meet the few people who are willing to experiment with community in this way. But even in cities, we’ve found it very difficult to round up people who are actually interested. The dominant culture is powerful in rural and urban settings…

http://www.wiselywoven.com J Fowler

Adele: I guess the best thing to do is pray. The LORD can connect us with the right folks at the right time. But it’s hard waiting. We know.

Robert

I would certainly like to meet the author of the book. I spent eight years (1978-1985) in a small community in a large southern city and WOW, does he know what he’s talking about. To his experience I could add the whys and wherefores of why we are what we are. I’d relocate to get involved in a similar situation.

Hi Jason, God bless you. We are in the process of building an intentional Christian community. Do you have a discussion forum? I plan a broadcast on the subject soon. Would be interesting to hear your ideas. Julian [at] godfmtv [dot] com

http://www.wiselywoven.com J Fowler

Hi Julian, Thanks for stopping by. We use to have a discussion forum but shut it down because I didn’t have the resources to maintain it – then we tried to revive it and no one came back. I’d like to somehow integrate the blogazine here and some kind of forums. I’m still considering how to do that. I’d love to chat sometime about intentional christian community. -shalom!

Guest

We’re beginning as a cyber community. We may not go any further, but all are welcome to join the vision.